Barry Lawrence Ruderman Antique Maps Inc.
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Colton's Nicaragua Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador & Costa Rica. Revised, Enlarged and Published by S.H. Goetzel & Co. Mobile Ala.
Stock#: 38861 Map Maker: Colton
Date: 1860 Place: Mobile, AL Color: Hand Colored Condition: VG+ Size: 16 x 12 inches
Price: SOLD
Description:
Detailed map of Central America, coloured by country and province, which accompanied a description of the War in Nicaragua. Written by the legendary American Fillibuster, William Walker, one of the most colorful of the Americans to enter into political intrigues in Central America during the 19th Century.
Walker is perhaps best know for his failed attempt to take over Sonora and Baja California and declare them independent states. Following the demise of his Sonora Republic, he became involved in a brief successful attempt to take over Nicaragua, before a similar scheme resulted in his death in Honduras in 1860.
Historical Context-Sonora & Baja California
Following the Mexican-American War, the United States had vastly expanded its territory, while numerous American speculators had made great fortunes through events such as the California Gold Rush. Not surprisingly, certain American adventurers turned their gaze even further southwards to see what other riches could be prized from Latin America. Some of the more ambitious of these figures even harbored designs to invade parts of Mexico and Central America, with the objective of establishing new American- allied republics. This imperialist act of nation-building was termed 'filibustering'.
Drawer Ref: Central America Stock#: 38861 Page 1 of 5 Barry Lawrence Ruderman Antique Maps Inc.
7407 La Jolla Boulevard www.raremaps.com (858) 551-8500 La Jolla, CA 92037 [email protected]
Colton's Nicaragua Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador & Costa Rica. Revised, Enlarged and Published by S.H. Goetzel & Co. Mobile Ala.
By far the most prominent filibuster was William Walker (1824-60). Born in Nashville, he was both a physician and lawyer and was famed for his charm and wit but also for his grandiose ambition and almost complete recklessness. An ideological American imperialist and supporter of slavery, his schemes were intended to advance these ends.
Walker travelled to San Francisco in 1849, hoping to make a fortune in the Gold Rush. While in California, he learned that Sonora and Baja California, which remained possessions of Mexico, were rich in gold and silver, yet lightly populated and poorly defended. Walker at first applied to the Mexican government for permission to establish a colony in Sonora, an application that was wisely declined.
Undeterred, Walker believed that seizing control of Baja and Sonora by force could be accomplished with relative ease. Furthermore, once this was accomplished, he was confident that the prevailing pro- expansionist sentiment within the United Stares would quickly lead to official American support for his enterprise. Walker recruited a rag-tag group of supporters of slavery and the Manifest Destiny Doctrine (mostly from Kentucky and Tennessee), to establish an independent republic in Mexico, which might ultimately become a slave-holding state in the United States, in the same fashion as the Republic of Texas.
In the Summer of 1853, Walker and his supporters invaded and conquered La Paz, the capital of Baja California. There, Walker declared himself the President of the Republic of Baja California, establishing his capital in Ensenada. However, his efforts to take Sonora (and create the Republic of Sonora), failed and he was soon forced out of Mexico altogether.
Far from being supportive of Walker's endeavors, the U.S. Government, which was then negotiating the Gadsden Purchase with Mexico, believed Walker to be loose-cannon and a political liability. He was tried in federal court in San Francisco for conducting an illegal war under the Neutrality Act of 1794. However, his actions were widely popular in America and a jury took only eight minutes to acquit him of all charges.
Historical Context-Nicaragua
Since there was no inter-oceanic route joining the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans at the time and the transcontinental railway had not been completed, a major trade route between New York City and San Francisco ran through southern Nicaragua. Ships from New York entered the San Juan River from the Atlantic and sailed across Lake Nicaragua. People and goods were then transported by stagecoach over a narrow strip of land near the city of Rivas, before reaching the Pacific and being shipped to San Francisco. The commercial exploitation of this route had been granted by Nicaragua to the Accessory Transit Company, controlled by Wall Street tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt.
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7407 La Jolla Boulevard www.raremaps.com (858) 551-8500 La Jolla, CA 92037 [email protected]
Colton's Nicaragua Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador & Costa Rica. Revised, Enlarged and Published by S.H. Goetzel & Co. Mobile Ala.
In 1854, a civil war erupted in Nicaragua between the Legitimist Party, based in the city of Granada and the Democratic Party, based in León. The Democratic Party sought military support from Walker, who, to circumvent U.S. neutrality laws, obtained a contract from Democratic president Francisco Castellón to bring as many as three hundred "colonists" to Nicaragua. These mercenaries received the right to bear arms in the service of the Democratic government. Walker sailed from San Francisco on May 3, 1855, with approximately 60 men. Upon landing, the force was reinforced by 170 locals and about 100 Americans, including the well-known explorer and journalist Charles Wilkins Webber and the English adventurer Charles Frederick Henningsen, a veteran of the First Carlist War, the Hungarian Revolution and the war in Circassia.
With Castellón's consent, Walker attacked the Legitimists in the town of Rivas, near the trans-Isthmian route. He was driven off but not without inflicting heavy casualties. On September 4, during the Battle of La Virgen, Walker defeated the Legitimist army. On October 13, he conquered the Legitimist capital of Granada and took effective control of the country. Initially, as commander of the army, Walker ruled Nicaragua through provisional President Patricio Rivas. U.S. President Franklin Pierce recognized Walker's regime as the legitimate government of Nicaragua on May 20, 1856. Walker's first ambassadorial appointment, Colonel Parker H. French, was refused recognition.
Meanwhile, C. K. Garrison and Charles Morgan, subordinates of Cornelius Vanderbilt's Accessory Transit Company, provided financial and logistic assistance to the filibusters in exchange for Walker, as ruler of Nicaragua, seizing the Company's property (on the pretext of a charter violation) and turning it over to Garrison and Morgan. Outraged, Vanderbilt dispatched two secret agents to the Costa Rican government with detailed plans on how to deal a death blow to the filibusters. They would help regain control of Vanderbilt's steamboats which had become a logistical lifeline for Walker's army.
Walker had also scared his neighbors and potential American and European investors with talk of further military conquests in Central America. Juan Rafael Mora, President of Costa Rica, rejected Walker's diplomatic overtures and instead declared war on his regime, the Campaign of 1856-57. Walker organized a battalion of four companies, of which one was composed by Germans, the other by French, and the other two by Americans, totaling 240 men They were placed under the command of Colonel Schlessinger to invade Costa Rica in a preemptive action but this advance force was defeated at the Battle of Santa Rosa in March 20, 1856. In April 1856, Costa Rican troops entered into Nicaraguan territory and inflicted a defeat on Walker's men at the Second Battle of Rivas, in which Juan Santamaría, later to be recognized as one of Costa Rica's national heroes, played a key role.
From the north, President José Santos Guardiola sent Honduran troops, who went side by side with
Drawer Ref: Central America Stock#: 38861 Page 3 of 5 Barry Lawrence Ruderman Antique Maps Inc.
7407 La Jolla Boulevard www.raremaps.com (858) 551-8500 La Jolla, CA 92037 [email protected]
Colton's Nicaragua Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador & Costa Rica. Revised, Enlarged and Published by S.H. Goetzel & Co. Mobile Ala.
Salvadoran troops, to fight William Walker under the leadership of the Xatruch brothers. Florencio Xatruch was named General-in-Chief of the Allied Armies of Central America. He also led the combat against the filibusters in la Puebla, Rivas. Later, for political reasons, Juan Rafael Mora was left in charge. Several Central American countries recognized Xatruch as Brigade and Division General. On June 12, 1857, Xatruch made a triumphant entrance to Comayagua, which was then the capital of Honduras, after Walker surrendered. The nickname Catracho, by which Hondurans are known popularly still today and the more infamous nickname Salvadorans are known by today (Salvatrucho), are derived from Xatruch's figure and successful campaign as leader of the Allied Armies of Central America. As the troops of El Salvador and Honduras were national heroes, that played a key role, fighting side by side as Central American brothers, against William Walker's troops. As the general and his soldiers returned from battle, some Nicaraguans affectionately yelled out "¡Vienen los xatruches!", meaning "Here come Xatruch's boys!" However, Nicaraguans had so much trouble pronouncing the general's last name (a Catalan last name) that they altered the phrase to "los catruches" and ultimately settled on "los catrachos".
Walker took up residence in Granada and set himself up as President of Nicaragua, after conducting a fraudulent election. He was inaugurated on July 12, 1856 and soon launched an Americanization program, reinstating slavery, declaring English an official language and reorganizing currency and fiscal policy to encourage immigration from the United States. Realizing that his position was becoming precarious, he sought support from the Southerners in the U.S. by recasting his campaign as a fight to spread the institution of black slavery, which many American Southern businessmen saw as the basis of their agrarian economy. With this in mind, Walker revoked Nicaragua's emancipation edict of 1824. This move did increase Walker's popularity in the South and attracted the attention of Pierre Soulé, an influential New Orleans politician, who campaigned to raise support for Walker's war. Nevertheless, Walker's army, weakened by an epidemic of cholera and massive defections, was no match for the Central American coalition. On December 14, 1856, as Granada was surrounded by 4,000 Honduran, Salvadoran and Guatemalan troops, Charles Frederick Henningsen, one of Walker's generals, ordered his men to set the city ablaze before escaping and fighting their way to Lake Nicaragua. An inscription on a lance reading Aquí fue Granada ("Here was Granada") was left behind at the smoking ruin of the ancient capital city.
On May 1, 1857, Walker surrendered to Commander Charles Henry Davis of the United States Navy under the pressure of the Central American armies and was repatriated. Upon disembarking in New York City, he was greeted as a hero but he aiienated public opinion when he blamed his defeat on the U.S. Navy. Within six months, he set off on another expedition but he was arrested by the U.S. Navy Home Squadron under the command of Commodore Hiram Paulding and once again returned to the U.S. amid considerable public controversy over the legality of the Navy's actions.
Drawer Ref: Central America Stock#: 38861 Page 4 of 5 Barry Lawrence Ruderman Antique Maps Inc.
7407 La Jolla Boulevard www.raremaps.com (858) 551-8500 La Jolla, CA 92037 [email protected]
Colton's Nicaragua Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador & Costa Rica. Revised, Enlarged and Published by S.H. Goetzel & Co. Mobile Ala.
Walker Meets His End in Honduras
After writing an account of his Central American campaign (published in 1860 as War in Nicaragua), Walker once again returned to the region. British colonists in Roatán, in the Bay Islands, fearing that the government of Honduras would move to assert its control over them, approached Walker with an offer to help him in establishing a separate, English-speaking government over the islands. Walker disembarked in the port city of Trujillo but soon fell into the custody of Commander Nowell Salmon (later Admiral Sir Nowell Salmon) of the British Royal Navy. The British government controlled the neighboring regions of British Honduras (now Belize) and the Mosquito Coast (now part of Nicaragua) and had considerable strategic and economic interest in the construction of an inter-oceanic canal through Central America. It therefore regarded Walker as a menace to its own affairs in the region.
Rather than return him to the US, Salmon delivered Walker to the Honduran authorities in Trujillo, who executed him near the site of the present-day hospital, by firing squad on September 12, 1860.
Detailed Condition:
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